Fashion of His Love
by IronAmerica
Summary: Tom Neville is, at heart, protective of what is his. Danny Matheson is his. He just needs to realize that. Everyone else needs to learn how to deal with it.
1. Whispering Secrets In Your Ear

Hey, it's up! In which there are two drunks and a lot of musings.

Un-beta'ed, so quibble away.

- o – o -

Fashion of His Love

Chapter one: Whispering Secrets in Your Ear

Major Tom Neville was a man with no regrets. He'd married a woman who, despite everything he'd done after the blackout, still loved him as unconditionally as the day they'd said "I do". He'd raised a fine son to be a fine young man (although he _did_ have to wonder, sometimes, if Jason knew just how proud his father was of him). He'd done well by his family. Fifteen years ago, his two biggest worries had been making ends meet, and Rob and his friends throwing a party that would end in tragedy—probably of the gang-related variety. Now, he was part of the force that protected people like his beloved wife and son from bastards like Rob. He helped protect people who just wanted some peace and security after so long in the darkness and chaos of a world without power.

So why, of all people, did he still have nightmares about the _one_ person he had _failed_ to protect?

The man sat at the kitchen island, feet propped up on the lower rung of the stool he was sitting on. His housekeeper would be horrified to see him in the kitchen after dark, but Neville didn't care. He rested his elbows on the marble-topped island. He'd been meaning to remove the damn thing for years, but had never gotten around to it. The major had eventually gotten used to its' presence in his wife's kitchen, and it had become a decent place to think once in a while.

The bottle of whiskey he'd hidden in what had once been a light fixture and was now being used as his wife's planter for a few scraggly coffee trees didn't hurt either. He was just grateful Rose—the housekeeper and cook, when Julia was too stressed to focus on the task—hadn't discovered the alcohol. The girl would have told Julia, who would have glowered at him until he'd gotten rid of it just to appease her.

Neville sighed heavily and stared down at the glass in his hand, frowning as he swirled the amber colored liquid around. It'd been almost six weeks since he'd been promoted and given command of Intelligence and Interrogation. Six weeks since he'd handed Danny Matheson over to General Monroe, only to be ordered to break the boy so Rachel—the boy's mother—would start talking. It had been several long, draining weeks. The only people who'd broken in that time were the rebels who had been captured a week ago as they'd attempted to plant a bomb in General Monroe's home. (The Militia's spies were no indistinguishable from the rest of the rebels, and all of them sported identical flag tattoos somewhere easily accessible on their bodies. The rebellion would collapse in a heartbeat now, an idea that made Neville smile as he thought about it.)

The major sighed and rubbed his face with his free hand, feeling the need for sleep and the sheer mental exhaustion of the past few weeks begin to overwhelm him. Unfortunately, sleep had been hard to come by of late. Danny Matheson kept invading his dreams, cornflower blue eyes wide and innocent and pleading. Neville hadn't been able to protect the boy for a week—almost two, now that he thought about it. The damage was getting worse, and Neville was afraid he wasn't going to be able to reverse it. The boy was already breaking, and Neville didn't know if he'd be able to fix it…even if he knew how.

Earlier that day, he'd stood and watched, face as cold and hard as he could make it, as Danny had crawled across the floor of his mother's room, begging for something to wear. Rachel Matheson was a cold bitch who didn't deserve to have her son. Neville had, in that moment, begun plotting ways to torture her as she sat, unfettered, on the plush sofa. The look on her face as she'd stared at her son, was familiar—she was a stupid ice queen _bitch_ with that mask in place.

In that instant, Neville had _hated_ her, with _every_ fiber of his being. Her ice queen mask had stayed in place, even as Danny began sobbing in humiliation as his captors laughed. The boy had begged his mother for something, _anything_ he could use. Major Neville had hated her, because she couldn't break and give her son—her youngest child, _her innocent child_—even a _shred_ of his dignity. The tears of humiliation that had coursed down the boy's cheeks as his guards instructed him on how to beg properly—like a good little dog—had only served to further the man's hatred of Danny's mother.

And… Okay, he was drunk. He was always maudlin and depressed when he was drunk. Tom sighed deeply into his whiskey, and downed what was left in the glass in one gulp. It burned on the way down. The man's hand shook as he reached for the bottle so he could refill his glass.

"Tom. What are you doing?"

Tom looked up, propping his chin on his free hand so he could focus on the speaker. He smiled drunkenly as he recognized her. "Hey Julia. I am getting completely drunk. Care to join me?" He saluted her with his glass, mentally congratulating himself on being able to speak without slurring. Concentrating on talking that much hurt, though, and it made him tired. He was _exhausted_…

"Tom," Julia said softly, "come to bed, baby." She extricated the glass from her husband's hand, sighing as his head dropped to the countertop with a dull thunk. "Baby, your back is going to kill you if you sleep down here. Tom…" The woman sighed again and pulled her husband upright, slinging one of his arms around her shoulders. And proceeded to drag him out of the kitchen. She had no idea what was bothering her husband right at that moment, but damned if she was going to let him drink himself to death on_ her_ watch. Not in this lifetime.

Julia managed to get her husband upstairs to their bedroom. As he sat on the bed so Julia could pull his boots off, he rambled about a prisoner he was interrogating. She nodded and made little noises of agreement as she put his boots outside their bedroom door so Rose knew they needed to be polished before Tom left for work in the morning. Tom was interrogating some boy named Danny, and he was wishing the boy's bitch of a mother would just break already so he didn't have to keep hurting so many people and why couldn't everyone just do what the president wanted?

Julia honestly had no idea what her husband was actually talking about, but the rambling seemed to be calming him down and he was getting tired enough to sleep. She didn't mind too much. There had been far, far too many sleepless nights in the past two or three weeks for it to be a bad thing. (And besides, she was collecting blackmail material for later. There was a reason no one in Philadelphia wanted to cross her.)

As she lay next to him, Julia listened for any sign that her husband was about to have another nightmare. He'd been waiting and working for his promotion and the command of Intelligence and Interrogation for _so long_…. It broke her heart that he was getting so run down by the job he'd wanted for so long. Maybe, just maybe, he should have stuck with the infantry and months-long patrols…

Julia resolved to discuss the issue with Bass in the morning.

- o – o -

Across the city, another woman was already having a conversation with the president of the Monroe Republic—or was trying to, at any rate.

Rachel Matheson stood next to a giant window, bathed in the soft golden glow of the candles and lanterns illuminating the room. Her arms were crossed over her chest, and her face was arranged in her usual stony mask of carefully crafted indifference. A bruise marred her cheekbone. It was the only blemish on her otherwise perfect, undamaged skin.

"I don't have to give you anything," Monroe informed her coolly. Rachel made a humming noise in the back of her throat as the man spoke. She could see his reflection in the window, and wondered what he was thinking. The woman sighed and rested her forearm on the windowpanes, staring out the window again. Was it really too much to ask that her jailor let her keep her little boy? She could look after him here, make him remember that _she_ was his mother. Not that Maggie creature, whoever she was.

"What more do you want, Bass?" Rachel asked quietly, looking up at the darkened sky outside her window. "I have nothing more to give you. I've told you what the pendants look like, I've told you where to find the others…" She rested her palms on the windowsill. "That should be enough." Of course, if Bass broke her little Danny enough before he gave the boy back, Rachel decided, she could plant herself as his mommy again, like it should be. Maybe she could get rid of his memories of that bitch, Maggie, the _whore_ who'd slept with her husband…

Her nose wrinkled as the smell of alcohol, strong and potent, hit her nose. Rachel closed her eyes and didn't turn around. Bass had switched to something a _lot_ stronger than wine—which Rachel knew he drank to annoy her—or whiskey—which Rachel knew he preferred to drink, because it reminded him of Miles. He drank the stronger stuff when he was angry and about to start throwing things. Once, he'd gotten so drunk that he'd thought she'd been _serious_ when she'd said she would prefer having _Strausser_ touch her. (Rachel had been careful to watch her words when Bass drank like that afterwards.)

"Find something, dear," Bass purred darkly, slinking up behind her. Rachel shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. She was wearing a jacket, but something in her captor's tone made her cold. Two and a half months ago, she'd been the one in control. Bass would _never_ have dared touch her, not if he'd wanted her cooperation, at any rate. If her baby girl, her Charlie, had been tortured in Danny's stead, though, Rachel _knew_ she already would have broken. (Not that she was going to tell Bass that, though.)

Danny's reserves of calm and patience and his tolerance of pain would have to be enough to carry him through. He'd always been a weak, sickly child. His first asthma attack without the luxury of medications had happened a year before she'd left for…somewhere more comfortable and secure. Danny had survived to become a sweet, sensible young man. He would simply have to endure.

Bass touched her shoulder, encouraging her to turn around. "Look at him," the man whispered gently, as though he were talking about a baby. When Rachel refused to look in the direction he was indicating, he grew impatient and wrapped his arms around her, forcing Rachel to turn and look at Danny. The boy—a teenager, but it was so hard to tell when he looked so young and vulnerable—was tied to a chair, head lolling against his chest. His wrists were lashed to the arms of the chair he was sitting in, and they'd begun to bleed from where he'd struggled against the ropes. A fresh, boot-shaped bruise was blossoming in the center of his chest.

Danny was wrapped in a thin silk bathrobe, belted loosely around his waist. It did nothing to preserve his modesty, but the boy had been pathetically grateful when his mother had broken and given it to him. She'd had a look of disgust on her face as the boy had pulled the bathrobe on and tied the belt with trembling fingers.

His guards had laughed at him for a few seconds, before forcing him back to his hands and knees. The guards had made him thank his mother, then them. They'd forced him to lick their boots clean, or tried to. The bruise on Danny's chest had come from his refusal to do what they'd ordered him to. An asthma attack and the promise of medicine had broken him of that particular stubborn streak.

Rachel frowned sadly and closed her eyes. What had happened to her baby boy? Where had he gone? Danny would never have left home, not where he was safe. He would have stayed close to his sister, or his father… He never would have left. Danny wasn't the baby she'd raised. He was a stranger… Why did she have to give up _anything_ for a stranger?

"Don't ignore your son, Rachel," Bass whispered gently, running his fingers lightly along her jaw. Rachel gasped a little, lips parting as she panted, pupils blown with lust. Her eyes snapped open in shock and not a little bit of fear when Bass' touch ceased to be gentle and his fingers dug into her jaw, nails scraping harshly against soft white skin. "How long do you think it will take, Rachel," he hissed angrily in her ear, "before little Danny breaks? Hmmmm?"

Rachel stiffened and said nothing. She had to remember that the boy sleeping, slumped over in that chair, was _not_ her Danny. He was just a stranger. She wanted _her_ baby back… She didn't have to give anything, and had _nothing_, for this stranger's child. Bass sighed in disgust and let go of her. Rachel rubbed her jaw and gave the president a dark look as she folded herself gracefully onto the loveseat.

"Bass," Rachel said softly, giving the sleeping teen a small consideration for his exhaustion, "I don't have _anything_ else to give you. Those necklaces and my cohorts were the only things I had left to give." She was lying, of course. She knew where at least five of them were. Hers was in a lockbox in the old Philadelphia bank, although she hadn't told anyone about that—not even the project team knew she had a personal one. Ben's was probably in Sylvania Estates, cooling in the ground with his corpse. Rachel wasn't going to give that information up, though. Some things, like keeping Bass from killing her after he got what he wanted, were more important. (If he ever found out that she'd been the one who'd suggested weaponizing the pendants all those long years ago, Bass would kill her.)

Danny snuffled in his sleep and coughed before settling back down. His breathing was odd, like his lungs had been scoured with sand or steel wool. Rachel knew it was the asthma, damaging his lungs little by little. She'd only been with her little boy and a world without asthma medication for a year before she'd left, but she remembered the sound. She remembered how to listen for an attack.

Bass shot her a dark look from the sideboard as he poured himself a glass of whiskey, apparently feeling maudlin an sentimental. "That's bullshit and you know it, Rachel!" he bellowed loudly, slamming the bottle of whiskey down on the end table just hard enough to make a loud cracking noise. The man smirked into his fresh glass of alcohol as Danny jerked awake with a start, panting in fright. The boy began wheezing as he woke up, making Bass laugh, a cruel, mocking sound.

"I think he's having an asthma attack," Bass said conversationally as he sat down in a leather armchair next to the fireplace. He watched with ill-disguised interest as Danny's hands clenched around the armrests, making a visible effort to calm down and breathe through his nose without gasping for air. The level of control the teen was displaying spoke of years of pain and experience and hard-earned skill. (Bass had almost _no_ clue what set off one of the brat's asthma attacks, but it was going to be fun learning…) He had to wonder what _other_ fun tricks he could teach the kid.

Danny's wheezing got worse, and it became apparent that his usual technique wasn't working.

"Bass!" Rachel shrieked indignantly as her son twisted in his bonds, chest heaving as he gasped for air. "Do something!"

The president smirked at her and sat there, sipping at his whiskey as he watched Danny regain control of himself. It took several long, agonizing minutes, but the boy's chest eventually stopped heaving and he was able to breathe normally again. The boy curled up as much as he could while tied to a chair, head bowed as he trembled in exhaustion. Rachel buried her face in her hands, whether to hide her tears or her abject terror at losing one of her precious babies, Bass didn't know.

"So like a child," Bass murmured, shooting Rachel a sick grin. He drained his whiskey as she closed her eyes, shoulders shaking.

Rachel didn't know if the bastard was referring to her or her son, and didn't want to know.

- o – o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Am I living up to the promises of the FOHL 'verse? Drop a line and let me know!


	2. Ain't I Good To You?

Holy shit, is this an update? Julia does some thinking, and Charlie is not a morning person.

- o – o -

Chapter two: Ain't I Good to You?

Julia paced around her sitting room, worrying her lower lip between her teeth. She was thinking about her husband. Tom hadn't been the same since the blackout, that much was true. That wasn't what was worrying her, though. (If the changes her husband had undergone, changes that had made him strong, had worried her, she would have taken Jason and run after her husband had beaten their neighbor—Rob, a man who'd worried her to no end for years—to death on the kitchen floor in Allentown, fifteen years long years ago.)

No, it wasn't the changes that were worrying her. Well, the past changes, anyways. The recent ones… Tom's drinking was beginning to worry her, a lot. Before the blackout, Tom hadn't been much of a drinker—one or two beers, spaced out over an evening, if her parents had been visiting, and that had been to be social. In recent weeks, though… Well, it had become a nightly occurrence for her to come down to the kitchen to take him up to bed after an all-night binge. Julia wouldn't admit it to anyone but herself, but she kind of missed her goofy, shy, sweet husband. She missed him being reserved and quiet and kind; it was great that he was so take-charge and lead-the-way now, but…she worried about him. His drunken ramblings of the night before had only cemented that worry into something more solid.

Julia had no idea who the "frigid bitch of an ice queen whore" was, but she'd heard quite a bit about Danny Matheson.

Oh, Danny Matheson… That was a bit of a problem and a half right there. Her husband's troubled state of mind was Danny Matheson's fault—not directly, of course, but he was definitely the cause. Julia had been so happy when she'd heard—through one of her rumor mills—that her husband had finally gotten the job he'd been angling after for years. And then she'd—over the past few weeks—learned that the cost was so damn high. Her husband had changed over the past fifteen years, but it was looking like he was starting to lose his soul. Julia missed her husband so much these days. He was still with her, still spoke and existed, but… Tom was a stranger now, in more ways than one.

If she were a weaker woman, Julia was sure she would cry. But she wouldn't. Julia stood up and squared her shoulders, jaw taking on a stubborn set. She was almost forty-nine, and felt like she was eighty-nine. It was going to be one of the days where she just felt terrible. Her son's problems were just adding to that feeling.

Jason was so like his father, even when he was another kettle of fish entirely. The Neville matriarch knew neither of them would admit their similarities, but more of them existed than not. They were, to the point of near-suicidal insanity, passionate about what they believed in and would fight for. That was part of why she loved them, though. Their problems were what made life hard, though. Julia couldn't trust them to do what was right for themselves. Oh, they'd get around to it eventually, but only after they'd thoroughly destroyed themselves in the process. That was what Julia was beginning to hate the most: Watching her husband and her son—her last remaining family—self-destruct out of sheer, pig-headed stupidity.

Before the blackout, that had been her husband's best description: Pig-headed and stubborn, especially when he had something to believe in or to work for, whether it was keeping an intern from making a bad mistake or keeping his clients from losing their homes. He'd been so good to his clients, to his family, to his neighbors. Julia had loved him, but… Well, there was no other way to describe him: Her husband had been a doormat. He'd gotten a nice dose of steel in his spine—a _very_ nice dose, if she had to be honest—but there was such a thing as too much of a good thing, sometimes. Tom was going to kill him over the issue of Danny Matheson. Julia couldn't stop him. Her darling husband wouldn't listen to her.

Jason, meanwhile, was going to self-destruct over his conflicting loyalty. Julia knew her only child was soft, and weak. It was who he was, at his core. In another lifetime, one where the power had never gone out, Julia could have seen him as a doctor, healing people of their wounds and ailments. He wouldn't have been like his father. Tom would have remained a nice man, would have continued to love his family with all his heart. (Julia didn't see him keeping his job with the insurance company, though. He just hadn't been ruthless enough to survive in an environment like that. Julia could have seen him as an entertainer, or a teacher. Or both. She wished she'd been able to keep her husband's guitar when they'd left the house in Allentown, but it hadn't been practical and no one had needed music when survival was at stake. Julia had gotten another one, just in case, after they'd settled in Philadelphia. Hope was _not_ something she could afford to lose.)

But to her son: Jason was going to lose himself when he tried to decide where his loyalties truly lay. He was in love, she could tell. She was, after all, Jason's mother. She wasn't privy to what went on behind the closed doors of the Republic (not yet, anyways), but she knew what had happened in the last few months of his year-long journey through the wilds of the Republic. He'd met a girl, and he'd fallen hard for her. Now, Jason was conflicted about where his loyalties with the Militia. If Julia had been able to, she would have told him to go back to whatever farm he'd met the girl on, and settle down. There was bound to be a Militia outpost nearby he could be assigned to, if he was _that_ madly in love with the girl. It would make him happy, as far as she knew. But somehow, she knew it wouldn't work like that. No, it wouldn't.

Some days, Julia hated the fact that she'd married into a family that produced such stubborn, pig-headed men.

The woman sighed and shook her head. This was becoming a circular argument, and she was losing it. Julia smiled bitterly at the thought. She needed to stop moping. And, of course, she needed a plan to get both of her beloved idiots to fix what was bothering them. If Jason ended up on a farm in the end of nowhere in the wilds of the Republic, that was perfectly fine as long as he was happy. If her husband was going to bring a catamite back to their home, well… Julia wasn't going to be too pleased, but she'd dealt with worse before. Tom was just going to have to remember that he'd married _her_ twenty-two years ago, and Danny was only to be a side dish.

Julia smiled at the thought of someone enticing her husband away from her and began whistling as she prepared breakfast. Rose was working at the Faber's home this morning, so there would be no outraged Spanish cursing following her around the kitchen. Tom was going to be down in an hour, and she was going to make him eat before he headed for work. Damned if her husband was going to starve himself to death on _her_ watch.

- o – o -

Halfway across the Monroe Republic, Charlie Matheson was just waking up, unaware of the fact that she had, somehow, been the subject of Julia Neville's thoughts. The girl had been forced to take the middle shift for the watch, and she was grumpy at having her sleep split in two. Charlie buried her face in her worn leather jacket, which she'd been using as a pillow, and groaned some curses that she'd learned from her uncle into the soft brown leather.

Miles, her darling, dearest uncle, was already up. That wasn't his crime, though, Charlie thought muzzily as she glared at the man from her bedroll. No, his absolutely heinous and offensive crime was that he was cheerful. And _singing_.

"Why did he have to be a _morning person_?" Charlie grumbled into her jacket. "He's being a _morning person_ just to spite me, isn't he?" The girl grumbled some more swearwords into the soft brown leather, trying to convince her brain to wake up from the fog of sleep that was trying to convince her that she should just pull her blanket back over her head and go back to sleep. (The last time she'd done that, of course, Uncle Miles had dumped her out of her bedroll, tossed her over his shoulder, and dumped her bodily into a river that was frigid. Her dirty look hadn't even made him roll his eyes in exasperation.)

"You know that I can hear you, right?" Miles called from his spot by the campfire. He'd gotten a small fire—easily extinghuishable and not liable to smoke—going and was frying something that actually smelled appetizing on a smooth, flat rock. Charlie had _no_ idea what her uncle was cooking, but it smelled good enough to make her stomach sit up and take notice. That alone was worth waking up for (although she'd never admit it). For a drunk, washed-up ex-Militia officer, her uncle was a really good cook. He still wasn't as good as Aaron, and he didn't even come _close_ to Maggie's skill, but he was good. (It was edible, which was more than could be said for Nora's efforts. Charlie hadn't pulled cooking duty after her first time had ended up with the skillet being eaten by…whatever she'd been trying to make.)

"Oh Uncle Miles," Charlie called back, smiling sweetly, "bite me!" She pushed herself up so she could sit back on her legs, shivering in the cool pre-dawn air. Out of practicality and a desire not to freeze in the least, she pulled her coat on; the leather was nice and warm from having been slept on for several hours. The young woman pulled the coat tighter around her, smiling at the warmth. Charlie's smile fell and vanished when she remembered that Danny had been taken without a coat. When she'd seen him on that train a few days ago, he'd been wearing a thin blue shirt and the same light trousers he'd been taken in. They were alright clothes for summer or early autumn in the farming community, but even Charlie could feel winter's approach steadily creeping up on her. It was mid-October, maybe, and it was already freezing.

How was Danny faring in this weather? Did the Militia care about his health or that he'd hated being cold? Charlie hoped they'd given her brother a thick coat. Danny had never handled being cold very well, but his thick winter coat and hat were still at home in Sylvania Estates. They'd probably been given to one of the village boys who needed it more by now. Charlie wanted to feel angry about it, but couldn't. She was too practical for that. And, unfortunately, she was still idealistic enough to hope that the Militia was treating her baby brother okay.

She'd seen the bruises on his face when she'd gotten so close to him on that train. The bruises—angry and purple, splashed across his face like they'd been—had spoken volumes. Danny was being beaten. Now that he was—in all likelihood—in Philadelphia, who knew what else would happen to him? As much as she wanted an answer, Charlie was too afraid to ask.

The young woman tucked her chin down so her nose was partially hidden by the tall collar on her jacket and scurried over to the campfire to sit next to her uncle. It was too cold to do anything else, at least until it warmed up a little. Aaron was never affected by the cold, the lucky bastard. Nora was, on the other hand. The rebel was wrapped up in two thick blankets and glowering at them from under the brim of her wool hat. Nora was not the kind of person who liked being cold, as Charlie had discovered. Charlie approved of her attitude—it was the appropriate one.

After Nora and Aaron woke up enough to join Charlie and Miles by the fire, the morning went smoothly. The party moved out less than twenty minutes after Charlie had woken up, eating the eggs Miles had cooked on the go. (Charlie didn't know where or how Uncle Miles had gotten quail eggs, but they were tasty and she wasn't going to complain about it.) It said something about how desperate they were to reach Danny that no one complained about the brutal pace Miles was setting. The maps Miles had acquired from who knew where said they were less than a week's walk from Pittsburgh.

Miles had gotten incredibly uncomfortable when the subject had turned to Pittsburgh, and had passed the conversation over to Nora. Nora had happily filled the rest of the group in on what was making him so uncomfortable: Pittsburgh was a Haven City, one of four if Nora remembered the treaties correctly. The Haven Cities existed in a kind of insulated bubble. While they were part of the Monroe Republic, the subservience was in name only and the charters the cities operated under let them do almost anything they wanted. The city of Pittsburgh and a great deal of the surrounding territory was claimed and well-manned by a mercenary company that called themselves the Amazons. Nora was uncomfortable in the area because she and the commander of the Amazons had quite a bit of bad blood between them…and the general had a habit of feeding the Rebels to her pet bear. Charlie didn't push for anything more after that.

The downside of getting closer to Pittsburgh was that the number of patrols increased. While they'd dealt with increased patrols since they'd crossed into what had once been a state called Pennsylvania, those were _nothing_ compared to the ones in the Pittsburgh area. Miles shared the information in as much detail as he could remember on their last evening before they'd reach the outskirts of the Pittsburgh Haven Zone.

On the outliers of the city, Militia patrols traded off for Amazon trainees. The trainees had a mentor with them, along with the occasional Militia member who was keeping the women abreast of the latest Militia tactics. Added to the fact that the Amazons were largely unstoppable and completely blood thirsty in their own right, and that most of the patrols had something that Miles called a "drug dog" with them, it was going to be a nightmare to avoid them. If they could be avoided at all…

"Couldn't we just ford the river here?" Charlie finally asked, after listening to Miles trying to explain why they couldn't cross a bridge into the city or get a boat to get around the Point. She pointed at the three rivers on the map—which was, admittedly, a little bit outdated—that surrounded the city's stronghold. "It doesn't look that big. And look at the map—it's supposed to be shallow." She pointed at something labeled "spillway", which the map said was kind of shallow.

"Charlie." Miles' tone did not bode well. "Charlie, did you happen to miss the part where I was talking about the patrols who have dogs that are trained to kill people?" His tone was incredulous and somewhat annoyed. Charlie scowled at him.

"Miles, it's not like they can be everywhere at once," she replied, just as stubbornly. Miles sighed, rubbing his nose in annoyance. He gestured at Nora.

"You explain it. You were there when the really crazy shit started happening."

Nora smiled at Miles, before turning her attention to Charlie. "There are a _lot_ of women in Pittsburgh, and more come every day. Ninety percent of them are Amazons, even if they're only in support positions and not active combat troops. Every single Amazon pulls down a patrol once a week, and three patrols during the summer months—peak traveling times, I mean. That's going to be a lot of people guarding the ways in and out of the city. We're not getting through without a lot of trouble. I'm not, anyways," she added darkly. No one wanted to ask what made Nora so sure of that fact. She was probably a well-known Rebel in the area, being one of the few women who'd joined the cause.

Charlie lay down on her bedroll after the fire had been banked low to keep patrols from spotting it and fell asleep on her back, watching the stars. She woke up the next morning, all conversations from the previous evening gone from her mind. For an autumn morning, it was fairly warm. The young woman didn't need her coat, so she rolled it up and stuffed it into her pack.

Miles kept his on after pulling on some strange-looking leather plates over his arms and shoulders. Nora kept her coat in, zipping it up to her chin over a bulky looking vest. Charlie had no idea what the two adults were doing, but put it off to paranoia. Aaron was the only other person in the group to not wear a jacket or armor, instead pulling on a button-up shirt over his well-loved AC/DC t-shirt that he'd had for as long as Charlie could remember.

They'd been hiking for almost an hour when they finally came to the river. Charlie had to stop and look at it, eyes wide. She'd been to Chicago, and she'd seen what floodwaters could do to a city, but she'd never seen anything like this, city _or_ river. In the center of what Miles had called the Point there was a tall building reaching up to the sky. It looked like it was made almost entirely of glass and sparkled in the early morning light, nearly blinding her. Charlie wondered who'd have taken the time to build something like that. Even in the Lighted Time it must have been seen as a colossal waste of time and money.

…It was still gorgeous, though.

Miles eventually pulled her away, up the river. That was about the time they ran into the three-man patrol. Charlie stared at the lone man in the trip, gaping at him. Her eyes narrowed and she reached for the machete Miles had been training her to use over the past few weeks.

"You," she hissed.

"Charlie!" Nate exclaimed in surprise. The two women behind him exchanged glances, before drawing their swords.

It was a very good thing that Miles and Nora were good fighters. Surprisingly, Aaron managed to prove himself to be good at hand-to-hand combat, even when he kept apologizing to the woman he was fighting. Charlie couldn't do anything, still staring stupidly at Nate as Miles knocked the younger man out and tied him to a convenient tree. The Amazons were hogtied and gagged with quick efficiency.

The only thing Charlie could focus on was Nate, blood running down the side of his face. She remembered how he'd thrown her off the side of the train, how he'd lied to her about who he really was… Charlie remembered, all too well, the look of fear on her little brother's face as Nate had dragged her away.

She wanted to kill the bastard.

- o – o -

So, what did you think? Good? Bad? Are Julia and Charlie good at finding the wrong conclusions about the right things? Drop a line and let me know.


End file.
